2012 NBA All-Star Voting: Dirk Nowitzki and Stars Who Don't Deserve Nod

We like to focus on the snubs sometimes, ignoring the less deserving players who took the places of the snubs. The truth is you can't have a snub without a flub, a player who shouldn't be in the game but is anyway. 

Here is a list of five players who are in danger of making the All-Star game who have no business being there. 

Danny Granger

Danny Granger is the leading scorer on the Pacers and the most likely candidate to make the All-Star Game for Indiana. That would be an absolute travesty. 

Granger's .377 field goal percentage would give him the lowest field-goal percentage of any player to make the All-Star Game in the three-point era. That's just unacceptable. 

The Pacers deserve a representative, but that should be Roy Hibbert, not Danny Granger. 

Amar'e Stoudemire

Amar'e Stoudemire is averaging just 18 points and eight rebounds per game. That's not bad, but it's nothing like last year's numbers either. Certainly it's not enough to justify a team with a losing record sending two players to the All-Star Game while better teams send none. 

If Stoudemire goes that means that they may end up with more All-Stars than Philadelphia, Chicago or Indiana. Somehow that just doesn't seem right. 

Pau Gasol

Much like with Amar'e Stoudemire, it's a product of having too many players from an inadequate team in the All-Star Game. The Lakers already have two players in the starting lineup. For a team that is currently in a five-way tie for fifth place, meaning they could miss the postseason entirely, it's hard to justify sending three players to the All-Star Game.

That's particularly true when you consider that it could mean that either one of two of the teams ahead of them, Denver and Utah, could end up sending none. 

Tim Duncan

Tim Duncan has never missed an All-Star Game, but he doesn't deserve a nod this year. He's averaging just 13 points and eight rebounds per game, nothing close to All-Star numbers. The Spurs deserve a player, but that player should be Tony Parker, who has stepped up his game and carried the team in the wake of Manu Ginobili's injury. 

Dirk Nowitzki

For Dirk Nowitzki, I"ll just let him make the case. 

"

“Averaging whatever, 15, 16 points, I don’t think you should be an All-Star,” Nowitzki said, according to ESPNDallas.com. “But we’ll just have to wait and see. I think there is a lot of great young talent in this league that deserves to go. I think LaMarcus Aldridge has been stiff the last couple of years. He’s a great young player, fun to watch. You know Blake and Love are playing great. There is a lot of talent at my position.”

"

Who's to argue with Dirk? He had a great postseason, but he hasn't had an All-Star year thus far.